"Of all the ways you might have imagined Microsoft screwing up, 'making something fantastic' is probably last on the list. As every business student will tell you, the first and most important step to success is making a quality product. Yet, Microsoft seem to have found themselves in the very strange situation of making something very good - their mobile platform, Windows Phone - and actually doing worse than before. Even more confusing, however, is that it might be Microsoft's commitment to finally get it right this time that has hurt them. And somewhere in this mess, there are a number of lessons for some very new challenges to businesses."

"Google sacrificed the quality of its OS..." is completely untrue. They allowed OEMs and carriers to make changes - it just so happens that OEMs and carriers are godawful OS/interface/app designers. On the other hand, it gives us the potential for stuff like Cyanogenmod, MIUI, and Replicant. I'll take freedom over a gilded cage, thank you.

But it is terrible compared to the competition. It is laggy, unpolished, lack integration, suffer from wide pixel density / screen size / screen ratio problems and until Android 4, it did feel totally unpolished. Each version do get better, but until 2.2, it was totally unusable compared to the iPhone or Palm Pre. The worst of them all was Android 3.0. It was so bad, Google refused to let lose tablet maker. They gave the OS to a limited number of maker to ensure no one got that terrible user experience.

Put simply, if WP8 is WinRT based, WP7 and all its apps will be dead in the water - they will all have to be recoded and WP8 will mark a complete restart.
The death of Silverlight is also the death of WP7 and its apps, which will have to be reborn as WP8 apps.
You can see why Microsoft hopes no one has noticed.
Moving to WinRT could be the biggest mistake Microsoft has ever made as, when the news sinks in, it will kill WP7 just as it is relaunched.

In case the above link confuses some here is something more direct:
[q]Put simply, if WP8 is WinRT based, WP7 and all its apps will be dead in the water - they will all have to be recoded and WP8 will mark a complete restart.

We don't know about this. Microsoft can still ship the WP7 APIs as well.

This is just like the time when MS went all .Net on everyone. They shafted the COM+/DCOM crowd into legacy and only provided subsequent support to devs migrating to .Net. The same could be said of DirectX vs XNA, WTL and ATL, etc.

The same WP7 app may run on WP8 via the deprecated Silverlight runtime but with no support from MS. Also MS has the tendency of making your legacy apps look out of place unless you rewrite it for the new runtime. In the end devs will still be forced to rewrite their apps for WP8.

Unlike iOS and Android, MS makes a killing selling you their developer products and MSDN. This is a motivating factor for them to push devs onto new frameworks and tools.

This is just like the time when MS went all .Net on everyone. They shafted the COM+/DCOM crowd into legacy and only provided subsequent support to devs migrating to .Net. The same could be said of DirectX vs XNA, WTL and ATL, etc.

Since when?

If you have been doing any Windows native development you will be aware that actually, since Windows Vista most Win32 APIs have been being migrated to COM ones.

XNA only became an official API in WP7, before it was an API only for hobby developers for XBox and Zune.

DirectX is still the official game API.

ATL is only being deprecated for Metro applications in Windows 8, you can still use it as official API for desktop components.

XNA existed since .Net 2.0 and Xbox 360. It was available for official development of Windows Games and Xbox Live titles.

Maybe you want to call MS and tell them that their whole catalog of Xbox Live games are written by hobbyists and it was never official? Because that wasn't what MS developer relations been telling me since 2007. You may also want to contact Konami/Capcom on Live Arcade and let them know that they are nothing but hobby developers?

The only things evolving in DirectX now is Direct3D and DMO, while some of DirectX has been deprecated by XNA-like junk. If you've spent any reasonable amount of time using XInput and XAudio, you would have an inkling of what I mean.

XNA is the ONLY official API that allows you to target Windows (XP and above), Xbox 360 and WP7. DirectX does not!

Just like with Vista, Windows Phone is failing because of poor marketing. And I mean all of the aspects that marketing represents, not just PR and advertising.
Their biggest gaffe is with brand selection - Windows is not a consumer brand, XBox is.
And lastly, WP7 lacks one critical thing - killer feature.(Office is not a killer feature on a phone)
If it takes me more than 30 seconds to make up my mind over WP7, then there is no demonstrable feature that just captivates.

EDIT: And yes I used WP7. I like the unorthodox design. The speed of the UI. Little things here and there. But it takes time to grow on you. I would never buy it after a 5 minute tour.

Another way to look at it is that Microsoft has been plugging at this whole Windows on a phone idea for a long long time without any significant success. And people think of WP7 as more of the same. You could also say the continued nonsuccess is the market saying noone wants Windows on their phone.

I agree. Windows Phone is failing not because it is great, but simply due to a disconnected and dysfunctional Microsoft view of what "Great" marketing is.

Microsoft does not Market or advertise well to consumers. They have incredible power to 'push' products, but seem to be absolutely clueless at being able to sell an idea to people.

"Windows" phone... What a F'g crap poor name for a consumer product. Why not just call it "Prune" Phone?

metroPhone would have at least made more sense. No body wanted Windows on a Tablet, nobody liked Windows on a Phone. They got it right with the sexy new UI and min. req. for hardware and took a big turd on marketing.

i always thoght of iOS and Android as buying into a platform. Apps i buy for one wont work for the other, even though its the same app from the same developer. Most of us have invested money into apps that i dont feel like paying for again just to switch OS's. If WP7 or Nokia could bring the next evolution to the handset market then it might be financially worth it.

I think this is the second article to make OSNews on the subject. Windows Phone is a good OS. Unfortunately it's timing is bad. Remember Microsoft Kin? It was a solid feature phone but it only lasted 6 months. As a consumer how am I going to know my phone will be supported/developed for the life of the phone? Apple and Android have been out for a while. My brother's iPhone 3G can still receive OS updates and use new software. I can't say that for Microsoft Kin or the previous version of the MS Phone based OS.

We are not hesitant of Windows Phone 7 because it is or is not a good phone OS. We are because we are not sure if MS will stand by it or move on to the next shiny market opportunity. After 2 or 3 years, I expect Windows Phone to take off. The big question is if MS is willing to wait that long for the Market to accept them.

Your brother's iPhone 3G (introduced June 2008) stopped receiving OS updates at iOS 4.2.1, which came out well over a year ago (November 2010). It didn't get iOS 4.3. iOS is currently at 5.0.1, with 5.1 in beta...

Prior to the launch of the iPhone people didn't expect OS updates for their phones, and Windows Phone devices prior to WP7 tended not to get updates. From everything I have read with WP7 Microsoft have been releasing updates for all phones. Since it's a new platform (7.0 came out in October 2010) we'll need to wait just over a year year to see whether Microsoft keeps providing OS updates as long as Apple have.

I doubt it's so clear (sure, it will be probably remembered like that long-term though; but popular narratives / mythologies don't have to be entirely correct)

Say - Symbian phones were traditionally getting updates, too (even if of a different kind, mostly bug-fixes; features were mostly frozen, and possibly for not bad reasons - different times, hw evolving too quickly and still always underpowered; software needed to be much better tailored, I guess)
Or, OTOH - that 3G (all Apple handsets in general) was mass-promoted and pushed on consumers for much longer than is typical ...so the period of support since large-scale sales stopped should be also curious to note (but is universally ignored by loud & visible pundits)

C++ support is a bad example and it has nothing to do with the success or failure of WP7.

I would also like to have the possibility to use C++ in WP7, still there are plenty of applications to choose from, because in the real world companies just use what is available instead of complaining about it.

The main problem is the brand. Consumers are already burned by Microsoft and Windows, and given the choice, they will take something else.

Then the Zune should have been a success, it has no "Windows" on it, and I actually haven't seen any Zune in my life so far. Now one owns one in Spain, and I haven't seen a Zune in all stores where I usually roam...

Then the Zune should have been a success, it has no "Windows" on it, and I actually haven't seen any Zune in my life so far. Now one owns one in Spain, and I haven't seen a Zune in all stores where I usually roam...

Consumers are not "burned" with windows, otherwise it would not be by far the most dominant desktop OS.

How about that people are aware of their lack of choice in the desktop arena. People are aware that to have their applications work on their PCs they need Windows. I bet if Windows did not have that level of application support, it would not enjoy 90%+ market share.

And there are choices, at least in the US. Those who do not like windows can buy a Mac, and those who appreciate their freedom can run OSS systems to their heart contents. The truth is that most people do not care, and for the desktop, Windows seems to work well enough for most people.

Microsoft has the "coca cola" brand for the desktop. Which was great during the past couple of decades because it is where the growth was. But it is a handicap when going to markets other than soda/cola so to speak.

How about that people are aware of their lack of choice in the desktop arena. People are aware that to have their applications work on their PCs they need Windows. I bet if Windows did not have that level of application support, it would not enjoy 90%+ market share.

People don't put so much thought into their choices; for most of them, Windows is the computer (an integral expected part of it at least) - when it's something else, when it looks different, there's "something weird / wrong with it" ...app availability hardly really comes into the equation.
By now it's largely momentum.

People think they need it, even if not really - on a typical PC (by now, some cheap laptop) I usually see them using web browser (mail also there, "web apps", fb games and such), IM & videoconf, players for music and video (well, and p2p software for both...); also some "office suite" (but too often something between Abiword and Wordpad would be enough; at least it's quite often OOo in my place); and that's pretty much it. It doesn't really need Windows.
(OK, curiously some few games have also weird following - HoMM3 most notably - especially among stereotypical non-gamers ...though, really, they mostly run at least just as well on Wine as on present Win releases)
Oh, but "we" (~"geeks who know computer stuff") might be not really helping, collectively (say, from "Games might not even" http://www.osnews.com/permalink?502709 )

Consumers are not "burned" with windows, otherwise it would not be by far the most dominant desktop OS.

Do people use Windows because of Windows, or do they use it because of the vast third party ecosphere around it? People use applications and hardware. The OS is secondary to that.

If a hypothetical OS, with the sturdiness of Unix, the sexiness of Mac OSX and the (perpetual) ability to run Windows software (apps and drivers) seamlessly, would come to market at comparable prices, would Windows be able to keep their dominance on the desktop?

If a hypothetical OS, with the sturdiness of Unix, the sexiness of Mac OSX and the (perpetual) ability to run Windows software (apps and drivers) seamlessly, would come to market at comparable prices, would Windows be able to keep their dominance on the desktop?

You mean Windows 7? Oh, wait...

Well, it's at least close (and Win8 could be basically "there", if they don't frak up with the ~Metro stuff ...but MS still has quite some time before the launch, and ought to still remember Vista) - any potential competitor should be somehow better.

Windows Phone 7 is failing because Android is good enough, and Windows Live isn't as popular as the Google products. Why would you buy a phone that integrates best with an email service you don't use?

MS just needs to bite the bullet and go full Apple the way they do with the Xbox. MS needs to buy Nokia, and take control of the platform. Keep it open with sideloading, user modding, etc, but they need to integrate the most popular applications to make sure WinPhone7 stays current.

They also should up their revision release cycle to quarterly, and up their version release cycle to yearly. This would create buzz by causing the press to talk about WinPhone7 more.

Before MS performs a full "Apple" they need to answer the question. Do we need another Apple? Right now they are trying to be another Android? Right now what the world needs is what Nokia provides. A really cheap feature phone that does banking, communication, and phone.

Think how many innovative form factors they could utilize if they did not try to be everything to everyone. They could truly differentiate themselves in the market.

Do we need another Apple? Right now they are trying to be another Android?

We need a better Apple.

Android has taken Microsoft's traditional position in the marketplace.

MS isn't going to give the OEMs the same leeway Google does. MS needs to understand if they are going to compete, they need to vertically integrate the hardware and the OS in the way they do with the Xbox. MS can either let the OEMs do as they will with WinPhone7, or they can go vertical. They're not going to have it both ways, and if they try to play the middle, they're going to find themselves in the exact situation they're in now.

This is the same Microsoft who has used their windows whip to keep oems in line by abusing their monopoly on the PC. MS is trying to work with many of those same players that in some cases they are extorting money from over BS android patents. You really can't blame these handset manufacturers for likely not being very enthusiastic. Who wants to play yet another market where MS takes all the big profits while they play all the handset manufacturers against each other?

Been browsing through the posts of this columnist, and he/she has yet to convince me that he/she is not one more Apple fanboy that does not attempt to understand why Android is successful before criticizing it.

Since I have more gripes against iOS than Android, though, my views on the subject may not be very neutral, so I encourage everyone to do the same : check out the related links on the right of the article, and make your own opinion about what this guy/girl writes.

Two weeks ago, I bought my first smartphone, and the decision was very easy: do I value hassle-less user experience more than freedom? No, because I'm a tinkerer, I like to break things, so Android it is. And anyhow, the user experience is well damn great, even for a 140€ phone like mine. I also bought an Android tablet for my parents, but only for the price, because they would probably be better off with an iPad. However a workmate got an iPad2 for Christmas, but he returned it and bought an EEE Transformer instead, because he values his freedom, and Apple not fucking his ass.

I really don't see where Windows Phone fits here, other than "having a fugly main menu that the Internet says it's very fast".

Microsoft is late to the party, and nothing to offer [...] I really don't see where Windows Phone fits here, other than "having a fugly main menu that the Internet says it's very fast".

Xbox Live integration. "Coincidentally" X360 (most of their venues, really?) go more and more towards Metro-style main menu, that should at least get quite sizeable group of people used to its aesthetics.

Microsoft was "late to the party" with home consoles, too. And now... well, while not exactly dominating numerically, I'd say they are clearly a very major force - maybe even the major force, since Wii has run out of steam & Kinect première.

That Xbox Live integration could be especially compelling given how mobile phones seem to be largely replacing portable consoles; games are the top kind of application (the rest is essentially covered already, anyway; nobody really needs "gazillion" filler apps).
Or how some possible combo of an X360 & WP7+ handset essentially... is a Wii U (and come on, the unveiling of Wii U used game footage taken from existing PS3 or X360 game versions), and more (Kinect, Skype, their big push for "TV via Xbox Live").
Do not underestimate MS.

Noone here is underestimating MS, I'm just not seeing the value it provides. Good for you if XBox Live integration is valuable, but it isn't for me and for anyone that doesn't own an XBox, whereas Google services integration is indeed more useful. I'm not into smartphones for gaming, but for connectivity.

XBox wasn't really late to the home consoles party: it was quite timely for its generation of consoles, and had some good titles to offer, and now with kinect and XNA it's a really interesting platform, provided its main competitor, the PS3, is a pain in the ass for developers. Just for curiosity, how does XBox Live integration in WP compare to the PSN integration in Android?

Besides, what does that "nobody needs a gazillion apps" mean? I indeed don't need a gazillion apps inside my phone, but among that gazillion apps I'm more likely to find the obscure apps I need.

Ehh, I don't even own an Xbox (don't benefit MS much, generally; and would prefer other paths for Nokia http://www.osnews.com/thread?502230 ). The issue is not on on the level of what's "good for you" or me; and it's also irrelevant how you might not see the value of dozens millions of households hooked pretty well into Xbox Live. Again, games are at the top of mobile apps, in usage - who cares it's not something to your (or mine) liking?* What matters is how it gives MS a great & fertile land to exploit (and generally, mass dynamics matter), I don't have a problem seeing that.

MS was clearly late with home consoles overall, that's what I wrote (sure, if you twist words in some way, you might show that the original point was "wrong") - and, curiously in context, the first Xbox was somewhat of a disappointment too, certainly under-performing in the market. But they learned, and came to almost dominate it (in long-term momentum, IMHO).

*similar with nobody really needs "gazillion" filler apps (that is what I actually wrote BTW), to which you seem to cling for some reason. But that's not really on the agenda for vast majority of consumers (just look on how few desktop apps they typically settled on in the end, by now; except... games), not a problem in mass adoption as long as decent support is present - and, with ~50k or so apps last I've heard, that's certainly the case ...portraying it like some kind of void of apps, which really gets in the way, is inaccurate.
(but BTW did you see what forms large portion - if not majority - of those "impressive" numbers of appstores? Few payment levels of one application; poor conversions of ~flash games; e-books, radio stations, "website UIs" & feeds packaged as an app & pretending as if it's not ~data better to be opened in an integrated manner)

PS. What PSN integration in Android? Last I checked, it was basically just monitoring of the account status ...hardly what I would call integration.
But games from Xbox Arcade can (and are) be readily ported to WP; or, the phone could be an accessory of sorts to Xbox (yeah, just like virtually everything a Wii U is supposed to be)

WP7 is not failing because it is great. It may be decent for a MS OS, but great it is not, so stop drinking the Microsoft Koolaid, take the red pill, and get back to reality.

WP7 is failing because:

- Microsoft is trying to hard to control the platform so device manufacturers and carriers really see no reason to use it.
- The Application environment is locked down to .NET so there's a minority of developers interested in programming for it.
- Developer's are interested in it, so there's very few applications.
- In general, User's (aside from the fanboys) don't like the interface, and there's no apps.
- Microsoft was late to market and with an unconvincing product.
- No one is interested in a version of Windows that is not compatible with anything else - e.g. their x86 desktop application's won't transfer.
- Every knows what Windows means - crashing, security risks, etc - and no one is interested in repeating that on the mobile platform.

WP7 is failing exactly because it is Windows and Microsoft. Windows 8 will only transfer the failures to the main Windows platform - the desktop OS.